Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Lapsed Pacifist

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 * (Lapsed Pacifist | talk | contributions)

Statement of the dispute
''This is a summary written by users who dispute this user's conduct. Users signing other sections should not edit here.''

Description
Lapsed Pacifist insists on repeatedly adding various notable figures to the List of Irish-Americans without citing sources or any evidence whatsoever that such individuals are of Irish heritage. Claimed "Irish-Americans" have variously included Eddie Murphy, Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Jimi Hendrix, Alex Haley, Ishmael Reed, and Alice Walker, none of whom are commonly known to claim Irish heritage.

Evidence of disputed behavior

 * most recent reversion
 * History of List of Irish-Americans with other examples and occurrences

Applicable policies and guidelines

 * 1) 3RR
 * 2) Cite sources
 * 3) Check your facts
 * 4) Verifiability

Evidence of trying and failing to resolve the dispute

 * Note on List of Irish-Americans Talk page
 * Note on Lapsed Pacifist's Talk page

Users certifying the basis for this dispute
(sign with ~ )
 * 1) &mdash;chris.lawson (talk) 9 July 2005 03:14 (UTC)
 * 2) Jayjg (talk)  04:28, 10 July 2005 (UTC)

Other users who endorse this summary
(sign with ~ )
 * 1) Not all information on Wikipedia has its sources cited, but all contested information should. The burden of proof concerning an African-American's Irishness is on the one making the assertion, and not those who dispute it. Ireland never had (any significant) slave labor, most African-Americans are descended from slaves who were given the same name as their slave owner, and the children of mixed (illegal slave and owner) relations were rarely ever allowed to take their white father's surname. Without sources, this is simply a question of Occam's Razor: to suggest that Murphy is most likely Irish because he has an Irish name is making too many unfounded assumptions. func (talk)  02:47, 10 July 2005 (UTC)
 * 2) I have contributed a lot to the list, while Lapsed Pacifist has only sabotaged it. I have tried posting to him in disscussion, but he stopped responding. 64.109.253.204 04:40, 10 July 2005 (UTC)
 * 3) He has been constantly pushing his POV across several pages, including Ahoghill, 1996_Manchester_City_Centre_bombing, amongst others. He does not show respect for other users or the very basis of neutral reporting. A brief look at his talk page will clearly indicate this disrespect. Nearside 02:41, 25 August 2005 (UTC)
 * 4) LP has a history of inserting POV stuff about Ireland to articles. He has waged a one-man campaign to change the references to Northern Ireland to the Six Counties, one of the POV terms that the different communities in Northern Ireland to annoy the other community.(Six Counties is an exclusively republican term offensive to Unionists and many Nationalists. Meanwhile an anonymous Unionist contributor keeps slipping in pro-Unionist terminology. It is like dealing with two children, having to de-POV their contributions over and over again!)  He has replaced Loyalist with Unionist, either as an extraordinarily illinformed series of edits or more like to cause offence and provoke the other side. He has been the subject of edit wars, 3RR breaches, two bans, etc for his POV antics. In the past, after a period of NPOV editing, during which people presumed his POV antics were over, he would suddenly return to sneaking in POV additions. Irish users, both nationalist and unionist, have been appealing to him repeatedly to stop and be NPOV, but he still seems determined in various articles to plonk in POV edits, to the irritation of other Irish contributors who end up, over and over again, having to clean up the POV mess he leaves behind. After a couple of weeks of NPOV edits he has again returned to his POVing of article. In view of past behaviour the behaviour that is the cause of this RfC is unfortunately all too in character.  Fear ÉIREANN \(caint)  17:41, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Response
This is a summary written by the user whose conduct is disputed, or by other users who think that the dispute is unjustified and that the above summary is biased or incomplete.

Hello. When I first edited this article, there were no criteria for inclusion except the title, List of Irish-Americans. I took this to mean a citizen of the United States of Irish descent. I went through the list and it seemed very monochrome, so I added Eddie Murphy, whom I believed to have at least some Irish ancestry. I am no longer convinced this is the case, though I remain open to correction on this (perhaps, in the light of this, User:Func will modify his endorsement, which concentrates solely on Murphy and ignores the other contentious entries). The anonymous user religiously reverted my changes and soon became abusive when I attempted to open a line of communication. Thereafter I refused to engage the user. However I made more entries, many of which (though not all) were immediately challenged. I found that, the darker an entry's skin color, the more likely that person's inclusion was likely to be blanked. User:Clawson entered the fray, immediately condemning my edits as "ridiculous", so I refused to engage with what I believed would be another user fond of insults. User: Clawson has since adopted a more placatory tone, unlike the anonymous user, whose behaviour has not changed. I engaged with User:Wikibofh and User:Jayjg in an attempt to reach consensus, as they were civil from the outset.

As I believed (and still believe) that many of my entries were being challenged because they had some African ancestry, I refused to cite sources (with the exception of Muhammad Ali), as there were many people on the list with mixed ancestry who were not being challenged because (I believe) their other ancestry was European. To illustrate this point, the English actor Albert Finney, whom I listed by mistake, was not removed by either of the two users who were reverting my changes and stayed on the list unchallenged for perhaps a day or two (I believe he is the only entry I myself have removed).

Other entries of mine have been blanked, usually military or political figures from the American Revolution or the American Civil War. User:Clawson and the anonymous user are also engaged in debate over other entries to the list, though they seem to resolving it amicably enough. It also strikes me from reading the anonymous user's edit summaries and reverts on the related article Irish-American (where we have also had our differences) that this user is prone to overly associate Catholicism with Irishness, to the near-exclusion of Protestants of Irish descent.

I have some sources for my entries, but I have been reluctant to cite them given the lack of research of the other users, who, despite their many reverts, have not once cited a source that declared that any entry was categorically not of Irish descent. I hope this makes my position clearer.

Lapsed Pacifist 03:28, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary (sign with ~ ):

Outside view by McClenon
There is something strange about the timing of this RfC. It was first added to the Rfc article page as a candidate, and then promoted to a certified RfC, on 25 August 2005. It refers to conduct that happened in July 2005, most recently on 9 July 2005. The signatures on the RfC subpage are (properly) between 9 July 2005 and 11 July 2005.

The conduct in question appears to have stopped approximately six weeks before the link was posted on the main RfC page. Why is it being posted now? Robert McClenon 11:15, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary (sign with ~ ):
 * 1) Robert McClenon 11:15, 25 August 2005 (UTC)


 * 1) Comment -- I suspect what happened is the editors signing this RfC in the last few days found my old RfC and simply added to it, rather than writing their own.&mdash;chris.lawson (talk) 15:28, 26 August 2005 (UTC)


 * 1) Comment -- If this is the case, then I apologize. I plead a lack of understanding of the reporting process. Nearside 15:42, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Outside view - McGann
I have had my differences with Lapsed Pacifist. I have looked at these events and conclude that he has previously done a lot worse. It can be most irritating to have to repeatedly revert. Lapsed has some very fixed opinions. A charitable view would be that he takes Be bold in updating pages, too seriously. Probably an RfC should have been made before now. This may not the most appropriate instance. On the positive side, he has done a lot of useful editing. He will, usually, engage in comment on Talk pages. Frequently he asks valid questions. I suggest that the problem here is not entirely Lapsed fault. Some rather unpleasant words were said on talk pages. That never helps. In general, we are poor on ground rules. Lapsed makes the point “there were no criteria for inclusion except the title”. That would be typical of many articles. However that could the include John Kerry just because he took part in a Paddy’s Day parade. Func says “Not all information on Wikipedia has its sources cited, but all contested information should.” A good idea. But – as far as I know – its not policy. If there were tighter rules or policies, both in general and rules for particular pages, there would be less aggravations. In this particular instance, I suggest that (1) Irish-American needs to be clearly defined and (2) a rule on citing sources (3)add words on how or why they are Irish. Even if that means that the list is cut dramatically. It is better to be small and reliable than to be big but erroneous. If I was to consider Lapsed edits elsewhere I would be more negative. However, in this instance, he has accepted that he made errors. As previously noted the misconduct is six weeks old. Much as I would like to, because of his pov edits elsewhere, In this instance I do not see any need to take any action against Lapsed--ClemMcGann 17:02, 26 August 2005 (UTC) Users who endorse this summary (sign with ~ ):

Outside view
This is a summary written by users not directly involved with the dispute but who would like to add an outside view of the dispute.

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Discussion
All signed comments and talk not related to a vote or endorsement, should be directed to this page's discussion page.

Lapsed Pacifist's response is filled with lies.

Lapsed Pacifist wanted to remove information about Irish-Americans being Catholic from the Irish-American page, but he left in information about Irish-Ameircans being Protestant. I never took out any information about Protestant Irish-Americans, but he took out information on Irish-Americans being Catholic. I wanted to leave both in.

Lapsed Pacifist is trying to make a point, but he isn't doing it in a very good way. People that are mixed with African ancestry are not being excluded from the list. Derek Jeter and Mariah Carey are on the list. African-Americans with no Irish ancestry are being excluded from the list.

Since you've admitted that your whole point of editing the list was just to prove a point, you should stop editing the list. Leave the list alone. Allow people who want to work on it to work on it without having to deal with your vandalism. Make the point somewhere else.

Go somewhere else to prove your point, though I might have already proven your point wrong, you do not want to acknowledge it because you claim I am rude, when no one has been more rude than you in this entire situation.

64.109.253.204 06:39, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

User:Lapsed Pacifist
LP's games include replacing Northern Ireland with the Six Counties, a POV term used within Northern Ireland by one community provocatively to offend the other. (Both communities have their pet terms to annoy the other side. It is that sort of place. Wikipedians have been queuing at this stage for months to tell LP that we cannot use either side's provocative terms here and must use the most neutral terms (which are usually the official legal terms). LP has already been banned twice for 3RRs on the issue and warned by everyone to stop, but he is back sneaking in his community's terms into articles . He has also recategorised politicians from Northern Ireland as Irish, again to push a political agenda and offend people. (It would be equally provocative to call them British. Northern Ireland was used because it doesn't imply "British" or "Irish" and is straight&mdash;down&mdash;the&mdash;line neutral.) He is also replacing the accurate term Loyalist with the misleading term Unionist, a deliberate provocative addition to cause offence to non-republicans . (Unionist refers to a broad community of people, from middle ground to extreme, who wish to keep Northern Ireland part of the United Kingdom. Loyalists are the fringe element, many with links to neo-nazi and rascist organisations, who are involved in murder, extortion, drug pushing, etc. Replacing loyalist with unionist is a deliberate attempt to smear an entire community as though that community was responsible; for example, changing a sentence to read On the same day, unionist gunmen attacked another Catholic girls' Primary and a Catholic girls' Secondary School. In a US context it is like changing articles to replace references to "right wing Christian fundamentalists" with the "Republican Party" on the basis that most fundamentalist Christians vote Republican!). That is only the tip of the iceburg of his POV edits, which are all intended to say a clear "fuck you" to any Unionist editor, or British editor, on Wikipedia. In other words "I'm going to rewrite things to push my community's POV, and squeeze out yours. Wikipedia is siding with me and my community, not you and yours". For every couple of good edits in articles he slots in POV terminology and slants in another. The result is edit wars as other users revert his POV additions.

The reaction to his behaviour on these and other issues can be seen at his talk page.

Irish users, who know exactly what he is up to (non-Irish users mightn't realise that apparently small changes changed the entire meaning, context and POV of articles) have appealed repeatedly to him to stop. He has been blocked twice. An RfC has been proposed but he still goes ahead pushing his linguistic agenda no matter what. Maybe neutral admins could try to achieve what everyone else has so far failed to do and make him understand what NPOV means. Right now he seems to think that anything that does not push the analysis of Sinn Féin is POV. It is tiresome trying to stop Wikipedia becoming Sinn Féinopedia. Fear ÉIREANN \(caint) 02:39, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

comment by sockpuppet for user banned from Wikipedia deleted as per policy. Fear ÉIREANN \(caint)